Tammisaaren seminaari ja koulukorttelit (Ekenäs seminarium och skolkvarter)

English translation (from the Finnish)

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Description

Tammisaari Seminary and the school blocks form a remarkably varied ensemble relating to the history of education and to the institutional architecture of different periods. Tammisaari Seminary is one of the teacher seminaries of the end of the 19th century, which were the result of the Crown's nationwide building programme and the planning of the Yleisten rakennusten ylihallitus.

The park-like seminary grounds lie on the site of the former Tammisaari Latokartano manor, outside the old town. The seminary for women, founded in the 1870s, includes buildings that are well preserved externally, among them the main buildings from the Latokartano period, dating from the 1600s and 1700s, as well as the seminary buildings built 1870-1900, which represent the typical institutional architecture of the period. Alongside the oldest buildings are also younger school buildings. The spacious park with its winding gravel paths is partly inherited from the Latokartano period.

The rendered, single-storey former main building of Latokartano is possibly the oldest non-ecclesiastical building in Tammisaari and dates from the 17th century. The two-storey, wooden main building of Latokartano was completed in the 1780s. The appearance of its facades is mainly from the middle of the 19th century.

The decorative, hip-roofed log seminary building with a central corridor and symmetrical room layout, designed by Axel Hampus Dalström, architect of the Yleisten rakennusten ylihallitus, represents the first building period of teacher seminaries in the 1870s. The main building was extended with a gymnasium on its south end in 1900. In addition to these, the oldest and well-preserved, high-quality institutional architecture includes the director's residence and the seminary dining hall at the end of Höijerinkatu.

The school blocks west of the seminary grounds form a townscape- and history-significant ensemble of school buildings on both sides of the boulevard-like Raaseporintie.

The oldest of the schools, the lower elementary school of 1841, is an hip-roofed Empire-style building. Next to it is another Empire-style building, the elementary and real school designed by provincial architect Jean Wiik in 1850. It was extended into an L-shaped building to meet the needs of the real school in 1878, according to drawings by provincial architect Constantin Kiseleff. Next is the oldest main part of the practice school of the seminary, a single-storey log building of 1884 designed by Axel Hampus Dalström. Opposite it is the kansakoulu of 1879, according to the plans of provincial architect Kiseleff. The kansakoulu was extended in 1898 according to the drawings of architect Theodor Höijer, when the building received wings the size of one classroom at its corners.

Near the old school complex, on its south side, is the rendered school with a slate-clad plinth, designed by architect Bertel Liljeqvist and completed in 1953. A school building typical of its era, it was originally a joint project of the town's kansakoulu and the seminary's practice school, intended to resolve the space shortage in 19th-century schools.

History

The school traditions of Tammisaari go back to 1603, when the pedagogio, the lowest level of the three-tier school system of the Great Power era, was founded in the town.

Along the old approach road, now Raaseporintie, a lower elementary school, an elementary and real school (alkeis- ja reaalikoulu), a kansakoulu and the seminary's practice school were built between 1840 and 1900, together with associated residential buildings, such as the headmistress's residence of the practice school from 1885.

A seminary was founded in Tammisaari in 1873, after it had been decided to expand teacher training to also include Swedish-language seminaries. A second Swedish-language seminary was founded in Uusikaarlepyy. The first seminary training teachers had been founded in Jyväskylä in 1863.

In 1867 the town of Tammisaari decided to hand over to the seminary the Tammisaari latokartano area, which had been in its possession since 1837. The main building, from the 1780s, initially served as a boarding house, and another residential building of stone construction, at least part of which may date from as early as the 1680s, served as a dining hall. The Board of Public Buildings' architects designed new seminary buildings, of which the main building and the director's residence were completed in 1873. The gymnasium, an extension of the seminary building, was completed in 1900, as was the dining hall on the western edge of the seminary grounds at that time, designed by the architects Decker, Gripenberg and Th. Granstedt. The seminary was closed in 1974.

Brick school buildings were built on the seminary grounds in the 1950-1970s, and a lukio was built in the 1980s.

The construction of the seminary's practice school was linked to the founding of the seminary. The kansakoulu intended for girls began its work in a new log house in 1879, together with the other buildings of the present Raaseporintie school block, outside the seminary grounds. The gymnastics and festive wing was completed in 1885, and the extensions of the early 1900s were also designed by the Board's architect Sebastian Gripenberg.

After the wars, new schools were built in the vicinity of the old 19th-century schools. The town's kansakoulu and the seminary's practice school, a joint project of the town and the state, were built to the south of Åsen in an H shape and were considerably larger than the earlier school buildings.